Today marks the start of Pride Month and I know, because people have reached out to me about this, that many libraries are either being told NOT to put up Pride displays or they are selecting not to.
I need to unequivocally tell you that this is not okay. No matter what you MUST put up a Pride Display.
We should celebrate all of the identity months at the library...every single one. Why? Well a couple of reasons. First, they give you a chance to highlight a community and allow them to see themselves in your collections. Second, the media in general has picked up on all of this months and they are all over the news even used by corporations in their marketing. By not celebrating any of these identity months, you will stand out for your lack of participation.
Now, I know some of you are under attack from those who want to stop you from doing Pride in particular, but to that I say, you cannot give in. In fact, June is the easiest time for those of you under attack to highlight LGBTQ items because the entire world is doing it. You are no different. And if you did anything for other identity months (Black History, AAPPI, etc...) you are simply following that lead.
This is also why I advocate for drafting Book Display Procedures. Notice I say "procedures." Those do not require your Board to get involved, that is policy. Procedures are created by staff to guide what they are doing and make sure things are standardized. Here is a post where I write about starting with the main goal of your displays being "We will promote and display books that our readers would not find on their own."
From there you need to add that you will have a featured display for every identity month. And also a final statement that you will make sure your displays are internationally diverse. Why? Because this allows you to offer the widest range of titles as possible to your patrons. You can decide if you set a number or percentage to use as a guide, but these three statements need to be in your display policy.
Once you have that in writing, you can use it to audit all displays, remind those who do not comply (ie, put up all white, hetero displays) that they need to fix them, and, most importantly, if they don't comply, write them up for not following established procedures. When you put things in writing, you show all staff that you are serious about this work and you have a way to discipline those who don't follow the rules. As Robin likes to say, "You can't stop people from being racist, but you can make it against the rules." She also like to add, "They probably won't be willing to lose their health insurance over it." But if they are, I say, good riddance.
This procedure will also protect you if you get a challenge to a Pride Display by allowing you to use the less inflammatory argument, "We have procedures that state that we have a featured display for every identity month." Or if you have a Women's History display up with a trans woman author, you can point to the procedure that says you make sure every display is as diverse as possible so that you can offer the widest range of titles to your patrons. When push comes to shove you can also make the money argument that our collections represent the second largest monetary investment of our library (building/real estate is first) and we owe it to our taxpayers to get the books they would want, if only they knew about them, in their hands.
[These moments are when my two decades as a trustee come in handy.]
These are the basics. But there is so much more you can and should do, but we need to start here. The most important thing you can do to promote all marginalized voices is to make sure you have these titles in every display. In March of 2022, Robin Bradford, myself, and Alene Moroni did an "Actively Anti-Racist Service to Leisure Readers" Preconference at PLA (details here). During her section, Alene gave advice on this that I quote everywhere I go because it is so easy to follow.
To paraphrase Alene, when you move from February to March-- Black History to Women's History months-- you start by simply removing all of the authors that identify as men from the Black History display, leaving all of those who identify as women. Then you add other women to the display. This ensures that your display is diverse before you even started.
Now, taking it back a step, you should have already had LGBTQ authors already in the Black History month display. As we move throughout the year, you keep authors that apply to each month on display. The more you do this, the easier it will be to diversify your displays because they will already be diverse before you switch them up.
But specifically, since LGBTQ authors can be included in every identity month, you should be making sure they are represented always. Having LGBTQ authors on display all of the time will help to give you less inflammatory examples when people challenge anything LGBTQ, any time of year. You can make it clear that all of your displays are always diverse in every way, all of the time and point to LGBTQ authors showing up in every display.
The key take away here is that you CANNOT include marginalized voices ONLY during their identity months. This practice is harmful. When you have, for example, a Fantasy display, you must make sure every identity is represented within that display. It is good practice in that it offers a full range of perspectives of the genre and because doing so will allow you to argue back to those who want to stop you from highlighting anything that isn't white and straight. You can confidently say, we incorporate all voices in every display. Only doing it in an identity month opens you up to being challenged.
Again reminder that general display procedures will not only support you in these challenges but also, will make it standard for all staff to follow them. This will ensure that even staff who do not want to make their displays diverse, have to. This ensures that you don't have some displays that are diverse and some that are clearly not. You need to standardize this practice.
All of this being said, there are still concerted efforts to stop you. Please see my colleague Kelly Jensen's article from earlier last month in Book Riot with detailed instructions on how you can prepare your Library Pride Displays.
You need to do everything I said and what she suggests-- both.
And finally, please go outside the box for titles to put on your Pride displays. Think about ways to frame them to make them more interesting. Identities are not a genre. Just like I advocate against simply putting books by Black authors on display as a monolith in February [rather, you should frame it by genre or a topic], do the same of Pride. Make displays like "Thrills and Chills: Pride" and put up crime, horror, fast paced mysteries. Or, "Love and Pride." You get the idea.
You can also use Pride content from other places to come up with interesting ideas like this list from LitHub, "10 LGBTQ+ Authors on the Books That Taught Them." This is a great way to have 20 books with an interesting frame for display online or in the building. Your work is done.
Also, here is the link for all of Book Riot's Pride Coverage. They will be posting multiple links every day and framing them in genres or topics like I suggest doing. If you can't think of ideas, don't worry, Book Riot will give them to you in ready to use lists that are also diverse by the identities as well. There is no room for excuses here.
I know this post is long, but the moment we are living in requires that I spend the time to help you fight back. We have collections that represent a world of ideas and identities on purpose. We have crafted those collections as professionals. We got degrees in how to do this. We know what we are doing. And while everyone has a right to decide what they read for themselves, no one has the right to decide for others. We must stand by that basic freedom. You cannot self censor and not participate because you don't want to be challenged or because you are afraid. That is worse than someone coming in and asking you to remove books for all because they don't like them. Why is it worse, because you know better. Because I told you not to.
Get those Pride Displays up, diversify your displays all year long, and get some display procedures in writing.
And if you have questions or concerns, email me and Robin and I will help you for free. We are especially good at speaking to you mangers or admins who don't agree. Let us argue with them for you.
